This is my kind of make-over. I love the wooden top… perfectly executed, subtle, and totally brings the piece to life. Well done.

Was the color choice purposefully meant to make this look metal?

wow — these turned out really nicely.

oh oh oh oh oh – lord but i love this before and after….. i’m drooling at my desk right now.

Wow, very nicely done! That looks wholly intentional, not hacked together!

The wood top & perfect color = Great job!

So curious as to where you get the hairpin legs?? I love them and we were wanting to find them to build a boomerang styled coffee table.

oops…I meant to also say that the bookcase looks ridiculously great! I love it!

The bookcase looks great! I really like that lamp, too. Where did you get it?

This is awesome, looks so chic!

wow! a before&after from-white-to-dark colour not the opposite as we we’ve had almost everytime! good coirage and great job!

this looks great…what an amazing job you did dawn! seriously, this is one of my favorite b&fs ever!

so awesome! love the color!

Un travail magnifique, une grande réussite. Bravo !
Kiss from France and congratulations for your blog

Awesome improvement! =D

This is genius. You can get hairpin legs for a good price on ebay.

Wow that looks great. So sophistcated. People have such imagination when they see things! I would never think of that. I love the colour they chose.

Lovely! We have acquired not one, but TWO sets of these wonderfully useful metal bookcases… and FOR FREE! We transformed the first set into a “buffet” of sorts in our dining room to house our cookbooks, etc.

Have yet to decide how to use the second set, but this is surely a wonderful idea! We might just have to try it!

Thanks for sharing!

hairpin legs can be found here: http://www.ianmaclean.com/

You can buy the legs from this site: http://hairpinlegs.com

I have been keeping them bookmarked should I ever decide to make another coffee table…or, looking at this great project, maybe a bookcase (as I am always in need of more book storage)!

love it!

Thanks you all for the great comments but my husband, Jason, deserves all the credit.

This was his brain child. I just sent in the photos. :) I love d*s makeovers and knew that others would enjoy seeing his handwork.

He found the hairpin legs on Ebay and the lamp is from Ikea.

Sorry to say, but barrister bookcases were never made to protect documents from fire… they’ve been around for a very long time and were originally made out of wood (still are). They were designed when books were very expensive and lawyers were some of the few people who had to keep lots of larger books for reference purposes.

They were made in separate modules (like the one used in this project) so new lawyers could buy one or two, then expand the quantity of shelving easily as their practice grew.

They were made out of metal in the 40’s and 50’s because that’s what most office furniture was made out of then… think tanker desks. Not because of any inherent resistance to fire.

The cabinet we used is made out of metal. While you mostly find these types of cabinets made out of wood, we always prefered the look of the ones made out of steel. The metal version look more industrial and blends better into our mid century style home.

These types of cabinets originally came with a metal top, but we didn’t have and extra one, so we attempted to make the top look as if it was metal. Using plywood, bondo, lots of primer and lost of sanding, we attempted to get as little of the wood grain to show through.

The hairpin legs were actually bought off ebay. You can find them ranging from 4 to 28 inches in legth, but we went with 12 inch for this project. They were attached to half inch plywood cut the size that fit into the base of the cabinet. Basically, we built a small table that the cabinets sits on top of. We didn’t want to drill any holes into the cabinet unless we had to.

Dawn, give your husband a BIG pat on the back because this idea turned out magnificent! I love it!

what a fantastic job!

could you fill us in on the paint color? im looking for that exact shade of taupe-ish-gray whatever that is for exterior paint!

Wow! That’s super inspiring. One of my New Year’s resolutions was to attempt more DIY projects, and this is a great kick in the bum, seeing what’s possible. Thanks!
xo Katherine aka. Urban Flea :)

nice! I just saw a gallery of vintage steel furniture yesterday – this reminds me of a cost cutter version of those pieces.

She did a FABULOUS job and I’m also curious to find out where she got the legs.

So very nice, the lovely books can be seen but not get dusty. Great makeover!

The paint used is called Painter’s Touch by RustOleum in Dark Gray (color no: 1986830). It’s a multi-purpose gloss spray. Here is a link to the site with an image of the can.

http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=97&sid=1986830

i have two of these…and NOW i know what to do with them. thanks a million!!!!!!

i love, love, love this!

i just love this too! now i’m going to keep my eyes open for one of these cabinets someday….

you two work well together. great job. thanks DS for featuring this great project.

the retro look of the hairpin legs and all, it’s great!

you know, I assume design culture generally rejects Ikea as a sort of necessary evil, but I have seen that lamp more places than anything else Ikea- design blogs, tv show sets, lobbies, convention booths.

Or maybe I am just hyper sensitive because I love that lamp and although mine is five years old and falling apart (as all Ikea things generally do) I refuse to get rid of it.